Ha! You Will Only Get That If You've Been Reading The Blog Of Late
I am referring, of course - obviously! - to Alan Moorehead, the Australian war correspondent of the 'Daily Express', whose adventures in both Persia and Libya we have followed of late. These Intros have been inspired by reading his 'Desert Trilogy', a classic of reportage that crosses the whole of the North African littoral and a lot of the Middle East betimes. Read his comments about the khamseen and the utter misery of enduring one, and a great deal of the 'romance of the desert' will be diminished. Art!
A contemporary illo of the <ahem> desert storm in progress.
ANYWAY I wanted to explore in this Intro one of the potential job hazards for war correspondents: getting ahead of the pack. If you've read my earlier Intros about 'Operation Countenance' then you'll be familiar with Al and his party of friends always turning up after the battle. Yes, this is a lot safer than during the battle but it doesn't give you an active view of what happened, or a chance for your readers to vicariously experience a whiff of grapeshot. Art!
That's the legendary journo and presenter Alan Whicker, who was a war correspondent during - you may be ahead of me here - the Second Unpleasantness in Sicily and Italy. He endured the Salerno landings, where he didn't think he'd survive - a risk if you're trying to get a story - except he did. His Ahead Of The Pack moment came in Milan, where he, as a member of the Film and Photographic Unit, had arrived well ahead of the 8th Army's teeth units. He found that the Teuton SS wanted to surrender to him, as they were besieged by Italian partisans out for blood. A bit of a responsibility. He accepted and they lived. Art!
Those are Italian partisans not interested in encountering live Teutons.
On another occasion in Libya, Al and his pal were ahead of the Australians, who were pursuing the fleeing Italian Tenth Army along the coast road to Derna. The war correspondents took a short cut inland, and encountered an old Turkish fortress that had been abandoned by the Italians, at Ain Mara. Art!
Al boldly strode forward and kicked the gate open, at which point all the Libyan levies who had been hiding came forward to surrender themselves and the fort, their sheikh foremost, who made an eloquent speech in Italian that ended 'Long live England'. Probably unaware he was conversing with an Australian.
This time there were no consequences for being a group of unarmed military journos well ahead of everybody else. Both Alans had gotten away with it - once.
Mere days later Al and Alex and Geoff were in a small forward patrol of armoured cars and trucks, when they came across Italians mining the road. The Italians promptly scurried for cover and the British patiently waited for them to surr-
Instead a very hot fire of machine guns, 20 mm cannon, anti-tank guns and mortars broke out, rapidly destroying all the vehicles and the crews inside them. The journos got clear, but Geoff was wounded in the forearm and leg, and Alex hit by shrapnel in the buttocks. Exhibiting discretion, they got out of the ambush as fast as possible, taking their wounded driver, too. Art!
AI Art Generator doing a bang-up job for once
They had to take their chances of being shelled and shot by both sides, as they were, I believe already mentioned, out in advance of the army proper. They survived.
I shall revert briefly back to Al in Persia, where he and his party of journos moved into and beyond the No Man's Land that existed between the British and Ruffian armies. Don't cavil at me using that word, it's one Al uses exclusively instead of 'Sinister' and by sheer statistical chance their is a fair possibility that many of the troops he witnessed were Ukrainian. There was a large gap where the 8th and 10th Indian divisions had pulled back from contact with the Ruffians, making Al once again Moore-Ahead when he took his excursion to Kasvin. Art!
A wonderful display of different headgear
This was a tad risky, and on two occasions Ruffian sentries came out of hiding to stop their car, as they didn't recognise British army uniforms. I dare say there was little chance of Al getting fired upon here, as the Teuton helmet, which the Ruffians would have been conversant with, looked nothing like a turban, a solar topee or a Brodie-pattern helmet. Must have been a trifle disconcerting as an experience. Professional risk, one supposes.
I seem to remember a party of journos being the first British soldiery to meet up with either the Anzio or Salerno beach-head, must look further into it.
Woody Strode, Donold Shuffled
Just a bit of casual mockery, which will probably get me banned from ever entering South Canada ever again, boo hoo, how will I go on, my aspirations are crushed, etcetera.
We briefly mentioned the actor Woody Strode yesteryon, because I dug up that he had a very successful sporting career before he turned his hand to acting. In fact he was one of the first black players in the NFL, which is the Nebraskan Fiddle Legion National Football League, and parlayed this into his screen career. Art!
From 'Once Upon A Time In The West', where he behaves as scurrilously as he looks here.
Now, in mentioning 'Spartacus' I put up an illo, which I'll repeat, with a bit of a comparison illo. Art!
Both these men are 6' 3" and 203 pounds. Allegedly. If I say any more the CIA will hunt me down like a dog.
Of Schedules I Sing
Your Humble Scribe is enjoying his early finish this Friday, as of 14:00. Rather than sit and binge on Youtube Reddit tales, I did a bit more to the blog, walked to Lesser Sodom, shopped a bit, bussed back, and am now finishing off BOOJUM! all before 17:00. Great! Art!
Conrad looking happy happy happy
Sadly this is probably the last 14:00 finish I will have, for the sacks of slime in suits who mangle our schedules are upset. On Fridays like this one, they get a spike in phone traffic after 14:00, which makes them unhappy, greys their hairs and causes flatulence and incipient ulcers. They will probably change it to a 10:00 - 15:00 schedule. Booh! For shame!
Up Next Is -
Number Six in the on-going series of recommendations by the 'Metro' for zombie films, three of which I have already seen. Art!
The most horrifying thing about this is the date - 2007. Dog Buns, was it really that long ago? Sheesh. I feel li
ANYWAY Conrad hasn't seen this Spanish original, but has seen the South Canadian remake, 'Quarantine', from 2008, which seems to be pretty much a carbon-copy version so close to the original that I don't need to bother with it.
SPOILER!
Congrats to the 'Metro' putting up a revealing shot of the ending without a Spoiler warning.
Is It Still A Thing?
By which I mean 'carbon copy'. This hearkens back to the days of manual typewriters, where you needed to hit the keys with sufficient force to transfer ink from the ribbon to paper. Art!
If you needed more than one copy of a sheet, you layered a sheet of carbon paper under the top sheet and another blank sheet beneath. The physical action of hitting the paper transferred the letter or number struck, via the carbon, to the blank sheet. You could manage four, or, at the most, five copies this way before physics and reproduction intervened. It was also incumbent upon the typist to indicate, via the abbreviation 'CC', that carbon copies had been created, which is where the e-mail notification comes from. Art!
The carbon paper is the dark blue sheet
That's all, pilgrims!
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